I found this article on the Philippine Daily Inquirer. It’s a great article to read for all OFW’s and aspiring OFWs. This is one great study that hopefully would be an eye-opener to those who are looking for jobs outside of the Philippines. We all wanted to work for one great company in a country that would be accepting to us. Others get lucky while others don’t. Hopefully, this article will give you something to think about as you plan to leave the country to work.
Where’s a great place to work?
By Mahar Mangahas
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 01:29:00 06/21/2008
“Where’s a great place to work?” is the title of an ongoing study by the poll group Social Weather Stations (SWS) that compares conditions in 21 potential country-destinations for overseas Filipino workers, or OFWs, using data from the 2005 Survey on Work Orientations of the International Social Survey Program (ISSP).
In each country, an ISSP survey consists of interviews with a random national sample of about 1,000 adults. The 2005 survey asked those earning a living as hired workers (54 percent in the case of the SWS sample for the Philippines) a large number of questions about their working conditions. It gives us the answers of several hundred American workers about US working conditions, the answers of several hundred German workers about German working conditions, and so on, country by country.
The SWS study compares the answers of Filipino hired workers with the answers of hired workers in Australia, Canada, Denmark, Finland, Flanders (because the ISSP member in Belgium has authority to survey only the Flemish part of the country), France, Germany, Great Britain, Ireland, Israel, Japan, South Korea, Norway, New Zealand, Portugal, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, and the United States. Unfortunately, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, which have so many OFWs, are not yet part of ISSP.
The SWS comparison does not include, for lack of convenient data, the wages available in these countries for OFWs. But the ISSP surveys have other items, including some described below, to confirm the great deficiency of wages in the Philippines compared to other countries. They help explain why workers migrate from the Philippines to those other countries, and not in the opposite direction.
Working long hours.
According to the ISSP survey, Filipino workers work an average of 45.4 hours per week. One can call that five-and-a-half days a week, using the eight-hour norm. Overseas (i.e., in the 21 countries as a group), the average number of hours worked per week is only 40.1—or the same as the official weekly working hours for Philippine government employees.
There is one country where workers presently work even longer hours than Filipinos do, namely South Korea (average 48.9); so, OFWs should be forewarned. But only a few average over 41.0 hours worked per week, namely Slovenia (43.1), Taiwan (42.4), the US (42.3), and Japan (41.3). At the attractive end, the countries with the shortest average hours worked per week are France (37.0), Norway (37.3), Canada (37.4), Ireland (37.4), New Zealand (37.4), and Great Britain (37.8).
However, since many foreign employers would probably seek workers willing to work longer hours than nationals, perhaps these country averages should be treated more as best-case scenarios for OFWs.
Wanting to work longer.
According to the ISSP survey, 59 percent of Filipino workers would like to work longer hours than they presently do, counting both regular hours and their usual overtime, so as to earn more money. Thirty-four percent prefer working the same amount of time and earning the same money; only a few prefer working shorter and earning less.
The overseas average of wanting to work longer/earn more is only 24 percent. It is highest in Portugal (46), a country that not only imports but also exports many workers.
The places where workers are least interested in working longer/earning more are Denmark (9), Norway (13), Switzerland (14), and Finland (15). This doesn’t mean that workers in these countries are the laziest. What one should say is that they are the least dissatisfied with their hourly earning capacity to meet their families’ needs.
Moonlighting.
According to the ISSP survey, 27 percent of Filipino workers have an extra job, aside from their main job, for additional income. Overseas, on the other hand, the average is only 15 percent.
Workers with two or more jobs are most common in the US (25 percent). Australia, New Zealand and Canada each have 23 percent. The places with the least of these are Japan, Portugal and Spain (each six), and Taiwan, Ireland, South Korea and France (each 10)—countries where workers most feel that the wages from a single job are adequate.
Worrying about losing the job. In the ISSP survey, seven out of ten Filipino hired workers say they are worried about the possibility of losing their current job. Four of the seven say they are worried a great deal (“talagang nababahala”) about it.
Overseas, however, only 20 percent of workers are worried about this possibility. The percentages are highest in Spain (44) and Slovenia (43). They are lowest in Finland and Flanders (both 10), and in Denmark and Ireland (both 11)—these are the countries where workers feel most secure about their jobs.
Job-hunting by job-holders.
In the ISSP survey, 41 percent of Filipino workers say that they are likely or very likely to look for another job within the next 12 months, even though they are already employed at present.
Overseas, however, only 24 percent of employed workers say that they will probably look for another job soon. The percentage is highest in the US (30). It is lowest in Japan (13) and Germany (14)—so these countries are where workers are most content to stay in the same job.
For lack of space now, I will postpone comparing countries in terms of various difficulties and advantages that the workers say they experience.
The SWS study is addressed not only to OFW-aspirants for assessing worksites but also to the concerned government and civil society agencies that assist our OFWs in many countries, and to social scientists at large.
tact SWS: www.sws.org.ph or mahar.mangahas@sws.org.ph
